John Metcalfe | john-metcalfe.co.uk | Official

25 August 2009

I have been busy working closely with Peter Gabriel on his 'Scratch My Back' project. This is a song swap with some of the world's most legendary artists and is due for release in the Spring. My role has been to help re-interpret the music of the songs he has chosen to cover - quite a responsibility as some of the songs are among the best known in the last 40 years. The album will be acoustic, using only orchestral instruments (no guitars, drums or world instruments) and range in size from sparse chamber music to much fuller orchestral sounds. We recently recorded the orchestra at Air Lyndhurst studios (George Martin's studio) in London which was an enormous thrill hearing the arrangements performed by some of the best performers in the UK. We performed one of the songs, Paul Simon's 'Boy In The Bubble' at Womad back in July. I have been working a lot down at Real World studios editing and mixing and will be continuing with that in the Autumn and it's been a huge privilege to work with the great man.